Breakfast Bar in Hard Maple

A few years ago we splashed out on a nice fitted kitchen in hard maple with galaxy black granite worktops (black with bronze twinkly bits in it). The only thing we didn't have was a breakfast bar. Now we do.

I drew a design in Sketchup and showed it to my wife. Initially it had tapered legs which she approved, but later she changed her mind (she's good at that) to straight chunky legs.

The legs are 891mm tall, 84mm square with a 1/2" roundover on each corner. The rails are 100mm in height x 30mm thick. I had to get the height bang on so that once the granite top went on, the top of the granite would slide in nicely under the dado rail on the kitchen wall. The size of the granite slab will be 1285mm long x 750mm wide.

The two legs are joined to the rails using hand cut haunched mortise and tenon joinery, which I also drawbored for added security since it will be taking quite a weight. The other end rail which is bolted to the wall is joined to the two long rails using hand cut half-blind box joints reinforced by two 45 degree glue blocks.

I finished it with Ronseal Diamond Hard Matt Varnish to match the rest of the kitchen cabinets. This is a water-based varnish that looks white in the tin and doesn't change the colour of the maple. I applied two thin coats using a synthetic brush. Being water-based it raised the grain, so I hand sanded with P320 grit then applied two more thin coats. Once the final coat was dry I rubbed out the finish with P600, then P1200 grit to remove all brush marks and leave the surface silky smooth with the same sheen as the kitchen cabinets.